Posted
by
CmdrTacoon Wednesday July 16, 2008 @11:43AM
from the oh-canada dept.

thepacketmaster learned of "...the possibility of Steven Hawking moving to Waterloo in Canada: 'A report out of Britain suggests Stephen Hawking is considering an invitation to come work at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics....But he's also being encouraged to move to Ontario by his University of Cambridge colleague Neil Turok, the mathematical physicist who will take over as Perimeter's executive director on Oct. 1. Perimeter confirmed last night that it has made a standing offer to Hawking...Turok is leaving Cambridge after failing to persuade university authorities, research councils and sponsors to spend $40 million...By comparison, Waterloo's Perimeter Institute has about $600 million in funding...The addition of Hawking to Perimeter's staff of top physicists would be a major coup for the research institute, founded in 1999 by Mike Lazaridis, founder and co-CEO of Research In Motion, which makes the BlackBerry.'"

Historically, Muslim regimes have been very favorable to the science. That's no so much the case today, but blaming current Muslim regimes on the Koran is like blaming the industrial revolution on Christianity. It's a stretch, at best.

You laugh... but I've known people who live in Maine that couldn't find Canada on a map. I could understand from the deep south, where Canada is a mythical land of igloos and Eskimos, but Maine?!? There's parts of Canada that are further south than Maine, and there was a time when that state was part of Canada, for crying out loud....

I think I counted once, there are 12 states with territory of a higher latitude than the southernmost point in Canada. The strange part is that Vancouver has much milder winters than Pelee Island, despite having a more northern latitude by over 650mi.

And actually the southernmost territory in Canada is Middle Island, just south of Pelee Island (home to some nice wineries), which is south of Point Pelee, the southernmost point of the Canadian mainland.

And there are far more Canadians with residences in southern US than in Maine, aka Snowbirds.

I was worried about getting modded OT but the Cannuck posts are scoring better than the Hawking ones!

"People who live in Maine"... thats your problem. Very different from people *from* Maine. A lot of Maine is populated by New Yorkers that couldnt afford Long Island waterfront. They cant find Massachusetts on a map even though they drove through it to get to Maine, and they hit a few Starbucks there on the way.

Real Mainiacs can be identified by their large feet evolved for crossing snow drifts, know where they are relative to Canada just by sniffing the air, and can find the nearest unguarded border crossings using a mutated recessive gene. A Real Maniac, most importantly though, will pretend to look at the map you shove at them and give you a fiendishly crafted answer with the sole intended result of making you go back to New York and never returning. An answer like "What's Canada?" for instance...

I was talking about Cambridge in the context of text adventure games... You know, 'cause Cambridge, MA is where Infocom started out and all... And someone said if I wasn't talking about England then I should be clear about it... And I was all like, well, we are talking text adventures here, right? So maybe it's reasonable to assume Cambridge, MA?

As it turns out, one of the original text adventures ("Adventure", IIRC) was written in Cambridge, England, so I got to be wrong twice i

To be fair, we have a Cambridge on this side of the pond, in Massachusetts, and it's home to a rather prestigious institution of higher learning. If one were unfamiliar with the work or background Stephen Hawking, it would be an innocent mistake to confuse our Cambridge (town) with your Cambridge (university).

It is possible to synthesize British accents. Hawking has had many opportunities to upgrade his speech software. He chooses to continue to use DECtalk even though it is outdated because it is "his voice" now.

To be fair, we have a Cambridge on this side of the pond, in Massachusetts, and it's home to a rather prestigious institution of higher learning. If one were unfamiliar with the work or background Stephen Hawking, it would be an innocent mistake to confuse our Cambridge (town) with your Cambridge (university).

And due to some weirdness involving Cambridge University statues and a Cambridge-MIT exchange program, the University has decreed the entirety of Cambridge and Boston, MA to fall within 3 miles of the University Church.

In reality the argument is asinine. "Look, you Atheists are just a religious as us!" is what seems to be the point. The reality is a bit deeper than that. As another post pointed out, an overwhelming lack of evidence of the positive existence of something requires that you default to "that thing does not exist".

The requirement that it *might* exist derives completely from the person making the positive proposition. You say that you believe a "God" exists. You have no proof of course, or at least none

Not collecting stamps gives you time for a real hobby, just like atheism gives you time to do real science.

Now, I don't say you can't be religious as a scientist. Actually I know quite a few very good scientists that believe in God. Usually, though, they take the Bible as a guideline for being a "good person", not a book telling you how the scientific parts of the world work. They understand the Bible as a guideline to live a good life, and quite frankly, it is a good book as such. Don't kill, don't steal, take a day off per week so you don't run into a burnout, and generally don't do what you wouldn't want others to do to you. That's a pretty good guideline to work with, if you ask me.

Frankly, I wonder how many of those that want to take the Bible all literally and insist in it being the all encompassing truth really want to use it to live a better life (for themselves, but even more for those around them), and how many just want to use it as a tool to wield power over others. It's been used for that purpose far too often. I'd say, more often than for the "better person" goals...

They understand the Bible as a guideline to live a good life, and quite frankly, it is a good book as such.

Only if you ignore the parts that say you should stone people, and eradicate whole villages if one of the members doesn't believe in the Bible's god, retain slaves, and that giving up your virgin daughter to a rape gang is preferable to turning over a foreign man to them. Those are just a few examples...

Which begs the question: if you can determine which parts of the Bible to follow (i.e. golden rule), and which parts to ignore (i.e. slavery, rape, stoning), where does the ability to "sift" come from? It certainly can't come from the book that you have to be critical about. It's clearly something innate in (most) people that is a product of genetics and culture. More than that, some truths are universal, they go without saying, and do not require a book as a guideline. As for the grandparent, if these people NEED the book to live a good life, you need to look for more competent friends. I say anyone who reads the Bible as anything more than an interesting work of fiction is a fool.

Science makes one assumption: The simple explanation is more likely to be true. The idea that fundamental rules don't change might seem like and assumption but let's look at our options:

In a random universe the fundamental rule it is: This is a random universe.
In a universe with an all powerful god then it is: God decides how things operate.
In a non random universe without god it is: Some set of rules define how all interactions take place.

Your are basing your assumption that #3 is simpler because it is simpler given your frame of reference. A lot of people will think #2 is simpler. You will even find some wakos that will think #1 is simpler.

What is it called when you try to adapt facts to your (mine, theirs) theory ? There is a word for it, but I forgot.

I find it interesting that you are trying to proof that god doesn't exist to an agnostic. How often have you tried doing that before ? (Trying to prove god doesn't exist to

Stop jumping to conclusions! User 243324 is correct: Hawking's potential move from the UK to Canada is clearly based upon US policy. It's the Republicans' fault, but the Democrats are no better, so he's going to pack his bags regardless of what happens in November. Plus, it proves astrology is correct. Take your nay-saying to Digg.com where it belongs!

BTW, Canadian taxes are actually a little lower than ours, and they get free healthcare! taxes in Canada.

No, they're not. Assuming the author of that page is correct, their federal income tax is (slightly) lower than what the US has.

However, Canada also has federal sales tax, provincial income tax, and provincial sales tax. The US has no federal sales tax, and state taxes vary widely (no sales tax in Oregon, no income tax in Washington, etc).

The GST Tax (General Services Tax) is currently at 6%, the Provincial Sales Tax (at least here in British Columbia) is at 7%, so here I pay a grand total of 13% tax on most purchased items and services. In Alberta there is no provincial sales tax.

We do pay both Federal and Provincial Income tax though.

However, after hearing the horror stories of people experiencing problems under the US health care system, I will take ours anytime. Its not perfect but its available to ever

Do you really think he's a member of the current Vice Presidential Action Rangers? Hmm... nevermind, it could be that he has promises from all parties to be rehired after the election. Hopefully Gary faked his own death; the Rangers need his chaotic determination to complement Hawking's rigid mathematics.

Say what you will about Mr. Turok, but I think it's *really* cool that a bridge officer from Voyager went on to be a mathematical physicist. Imagine our loss if the ship was still stuck in the delta quadrant.

Hawking will have his venerable voicebox replaced by one of Canadian manufacture, based on an amalgamation of Geddy Lee and Alex Trebek's voice, which automatically interjects "eh" every 8th word.

Meh, everybody's raising this possibility.... While it is a very real possibility, I think you're all missing the bigger picture here.

What do they make in Canada? Beer, Mounties, snow... oh, and the frikkin Canadarm [wikipedia.org]! The chair is bound to receive upgrades based on this technology - probably a quadrupedal locomotion system and two massive manipulators, all Canadarm-based...

One of the coolest things about the Perimeter Institute is that they have a public lecture series. The lecturers are a mix of eminent scientists from inside and outside the Institute. The topics are mostly drawn from the edges of physics and cosmology. Some are more accessible to lay people than other.

As a Computer Science major at the University of Waterloo, I'm proud to hear that the Waterloo region and it's research and higher education institutes are attracting top minds to the area. Arguably, the university is already the top undergrad tech school in Canada and competitive with the top in the U.S. as well, but currently only on the undergraduate level. However, huge amounts of funding have been recently pouring into UW's graduate programs, and associated research institutes. Some Waterloo folks like to label the university "MIT of the north" but unfortunately, I'd argue that's currently only true on the undergraduate level. Its co-op program makes Waterloo grads among the most employable new grads in the world. With this kind of exposure I'm sure Waterloo will reach its goal of being competitive with the top U.S. tech schools in all areas within the next 5 to 10 years. Maybe they'll start making movies with references to Waterloo as well.:P Then again, most movies are made/produced in the U.S...

There's a sweet little 'Canadian Heritage' edvert that illustrates this as Cartier and company coming over a hill and meeting said Iroquois for the first time. The local elder offers to bring them to his village, repeatedly using the word 'kanata.' Cartier turns to a religious scholar, and asks for a translation. The scholar, having never heard this langua

The University of Cambridge has poured cold water on reports its most famous physicist might be coming to Canada to work, saying Wednesday Stephen Hawking "has no plans" to leave.

A report in the Daily Telegraph in the U.K. said Hawking was contemplating joining his colleague Neil Turok at Waterloo, Ont.'s Perimeter Institute. The South African-born cosmologist Turok, 49, is leaving Cambridge to take over the role of executive director at the institute, which was founded in 2000 by Research in Motion co-founder Mike Lazaridis and is devoted to the study of theoretical physics.

Your ideas are shaped not just by your capabilities, but the ideas and interactions you came up with when you were growing up.

I believe that there is a significant percentage of population (probably around 10%) that could be just as bright as the top people in sciences, but they just took a different path. They didn't get the encouragements, or maybe they just didn't meet a friend in the 5th grade that had the same interest as them.

There is more to whom we become than some political structure. The ultimate you is shaped MUCH closer to your personal life than even the city hall.

I believe that there is a significant percentage of population (probably around 10%) that could be just as bright as the top people in sciences, but they just took a different path. They didn't get the encouragements, or maybe they just didn't meet a friend in the 5th grade that had the same interest as them.

In India, I'd bet the caste system [wikipedia.org] has a bit to do with that as well...

That appeal to statistics assumes that the population of brilliant people (both inherently brilliant and the learned) is uniformly distributed among the rest of the population of the world. This is demonstrably not the case. Some cities have higher concentrations of inventors, entrepeneurs, PhDs, etc., than other cities of equal size. Perhaps one city has a university to draw these people in, while the other one doesn't. Perhaps one area, way back when, had a guy or group of people that made some major discovery, started a new industry, which set that region on the path to continued discovery (e.g., Silicon Valley).

The same could be said for countries as a whole. One would expect to find a greater proportion of scientists in an industrialized country over an agrarian one, or over a nation that has only recently industrialized.

I am not trying to make a nationalistic or xenophobic argument against India or China, because I know for a fact that they have lots of brilliant people, I am just trying to delve deeper into the notion that a larger national population equals a larger population of [whatever else].

The same could be said for countries as a whole. One would expect to find a greater proportion of scientists in an industrialized country over an agrarian one, or over a nation that has only recently industrialized.

Disparity of salaries between University Professors and Football Coaches - overall, who provides more long term gain to society and who are rewarded more in terms of salary (almost an order of magnitude difference)?

Well, on the point of providing value to society, that will rathole into a debate about what is "good for society", assuming that there's an objective or even subjective-with-high-consensus notion of such a thing. It's not clear that people want to live longer, healthier, more intellectually sti

Ah, the "perimeter" institute. eh?Is that where mathematical geniuses figured out that the perimeter of a circle is 2*PI*r?Have they made any headway on finding a formula for the perimeter of a Mandelbrot fractal?

No, it was on their website. They posted their grad student salaries online. Although they seem to have redone their website for this since I last checked and taken this information down (i.e. it looks very different).

I doubt Stephen Hawking gets out and about very much. And not just because of his disability. Many brilliant people are so eccentric they never need to leave their place of research, so it doesn't worry them too much whether their community is a happening place or not.

Waterloo has the best or at least second best computer science, mathematics and engineering programs in Ontario. I'm not sure where you gathered your information. Maybe if you are talking about arts degrees, but that is not what Waterloo is known for. I also don't think that Hawkings is hankering to get a fine arts degree, either.

I love waterloo, I decided to stay here after I got my university degree there. It's really nice to have an office with trees outside. It's only an hour away from Toronto, and it has a very large Asian community so the food here is great and varied. And despite what you think we are one of the premier Math and Computer science school in North America, we compete with MIT for contests.